Improv Soup: Loaded Baked Potato

I am somewhat of an improvisational cook.  Sometimes this results in amazing, one-of-a-kind meals, and sometimes it results in somewhat of a failure.  Some soothsayers may say that nothing I cook is a fail, but case in point of a less than successful dish was last week's Sunday dinner.    I was pretty tired after my long day in the kitchen, and I may have made some shortcuts that didn't pay off when making cornmeal-breaded chicken tenders and buffalo dipping sauce.  My sweet boyfriend ate it anyway, but his confused tone when he asked, "So what is in this breading?" was a clear tip off that it was not tasty.
Anyway, this Sunday's foray in the kitchen was much more successful, and for once I remember what I did to construct such a lovely meal!

After two entire weeks of more acid reflux than anyone should ever experience (no more coffee for me!) I was craving simple yet tasty foods, so a potato soup came to mind.  However, my usual potato soup is pretty acidic with vinegar and mustard to spice it up.  Not feeling an acidic dish, I decided to try a loaded baked potato soup without making another trip to the store.  I threw all of this into my crock pot:

Loaded Baked Potato Soup
serves 6-8

5 Yukon Gold potatoes, diced
3 cups chicken broth
2 cups almond milk (any milk or milk substitute would work)
1 cup cheddar cheese
1/2 cup butter (had I used actual dairy or a milk with a higher fat content I would have reduced the amount of butter)
onion powder (an actual diced onion would be fab, but I didn't have one)
1 clove garlic, crushed
dried chives
black pepper
salt to taste

I set the slow cooker on low and left it for about 6 hours.  Then I used an immersion blender to blend most of the soup, leaving some chunks of potato.  Next I cooked about a half pound of bacon in the oven (425 degrees for 15 min--thank you pinterest!)  and diced it after it cooled.  Once I stirred in the diced bacon and a little bit of bacon fat, dinner was ready!  Instead of unconvincingly reassuring comments and quizzical looks, this time my boyfriend said something along the lines of "This soup is bangin'!  You nailed it!" (This was not a direct apology for threatening to put me back into the binder of women when dinner was not ready promptly at five, but I chose to take it as an indirect apology ;-)) With a nice texture and bacon in every bite of the soup, I had to agree--I nailed it.  Even my mostly vegetarian sister had some...although she had just run a marathon.

Albeit delicious, this is NOT shaping up to be a low fat week.  Tomorrow I'll tell you about the gluten free peanut butter banana cupcakes I engineered!  Perfect for marathon recovery, don't you think?

Book Review: One Day

Even at quite a young age, I loved When Harry Met Sally.  I loved the idea that two people can dance in and out of each others' lives as acquaintances, friends, lovers, and enemies, and maybe, just maybe, end up together.  The easiest way to describe One Day by David Nicholls is to say that it's  a British version of the Nora Ephron modern classic that spans 20 years yet only looks at one day per year of these two star-crossed friends' lives.  But that would be doing this novel a disservice.  One Day is not only a story of two friends, but also the story of how each individual overcomes personal demons and comes into his or her own.  Sometimes the arc of their lives intersect, sometimes they do not.

Emma and Dexter meet on the day of the college graduation in 1988.  They both feel an attraction towards each other, but their lives are quickly moving in two very different directions, so they choose to remain friends instead of embarking on a surely doomed relationship.  Emma, a distinguished scholar, ends up working in a tacky Mexican restaurant for years instead of unleashing the political literary guru inside her.  Is she stuck in this dead-end job because of the recession as she proclaims, or is Emma herself lacking in talent or determination?  Dexter, a mediocre student, launches on a world tour only to fall into a lucrative yet short lived career as a television personality upon his return to England.  Will he remain an overnight sensation or will his hardpartying and womanizing ways be his downfall?  This is only the beginning of each of their lives.  Peppered with nostalgic pop culture references, Emma and Dexter experience 20 years of personal growth, failure, career changes, and life changing events, all while remaining a part of each others' lives.  While a bit archetypal and predictable at times, I found both Em and Dex's journeys to be entertaining, and their interactions so very real. 

Verdict:  One might think that 20 years of will-they or won't-they would get boring, but Nicholls' storytelling device of revealing only the events of July 15 of each year kept me turning pages, often in frustration over a missed encounter or the rabid desire to read more about Em and Dex's sexually frustrating trip to Greece.  Don't expect a stuffy literary masterpiece when you pick up this novel, but do expect to be completely absorbed and invested in the events and outcome of this lifelong friendship.  And if that's not enough to convince you to read, a film version starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess is slated to be released in 2011.

Frogged

It's a strange feeling when ending something that should be pleasureable is a relief. Of course, it's not strange if that thing that should be fun or enjoyable is neither. My last post, Pushing Through, is sort of my unintentional life philosophy. Just keep going if you've made a mistake. No one will notice except you. Just keep going and it will turn out ok in the end. This is why I incurably got lost until I bought a GPS navigation system for my car, why most of my knit or crocheted FOs have tiny mistakes in them, and why I've been involved with a certain someone for more than two years. This week I found myself in this position where I just could not keep going and hoping that everything would turn out all right in the end. I frogged my February Lady Sweater and broke off things with that certain someone. To my surprise, I found that when I came to each decision, it was easy to take that step. I ripped it all out; said those words "I can't do this anymore." Of course I will miss him, just as I am slightly disappointed that I don't have anything physical to show for the past 6 weeks of on and off knitting on my FLS. Nevertheless, now that I'm starting from point zero, I am confident that this time I will pay attention to the pattern and the feeling in my gut that I have been ignoring for quite some time. I need to constantly remind myself that I am not smarter than the pattern designer, the thousands of people who have knit this sweater before me, or the intuitive feeling that it's time to move on.